Escape

A week and a half ago, Tommy Gargoyle went on an adventure outside. It had been snowing and was pretty much freezing, and my bub slipped out past three people on the front stoop while I was having words with the FedEx man over a package that wasn’t delivered. We noticed the 9 lb tortie cat slip out and I went after her, but no one saw the 13 lb giant blue child of mine wander off.

Two hours later I noticed he wasn’t coming around begging for food time. I just had the Stew asking me about it.
Um. Tom? No way. No way. I checked the entire house and the basement three times and decided to go outside looking for him. We live off a major roadway so there is a variety of things that can happen here:

My cat can get hit by a car.

My cat’s microchip has migrated down into his arm pit and he can end up in the shelter with it never being read.

My cat could find a new family.

My cat could die in the cold.

I set up a lost pet alert with Home Again (I had just registered all my cats with them when we moved to Maryland/DC), and Dismal and I took flashlights and went up and down our street four times. Then we checked at least four other streets before my legs were killing me and I told D I was heading back home. I called Tommy the entire way and then I left the front and back doors open so it was just the storm doors and maybe I could hear him. I broke down and cried. I fed Stewart and cried. About twenty minutes later I heard Dismal banging on the front door with my cat in his arms. I cried some more.

That big chicken was next door, under their porch. Dismal caught his eyes with the torch and then started to approach, calling his name and then stopped, and the bubba walked right out to him.